Creating the Dream Space

Creating the Dream Space
by Aida Eltorie
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IN RETROSPECT
Photo credit: Amr Mounib
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Susan Hefuna is a
foreigner of her own land.
Half here, half somewhere
else, she overrides the asss
sumed stereotype that defs
fines her cultural differences.
Playing with the exoticism
of two clearly unabridged
cultures of Egypt and Germs
many, she is not from the Ories
ent, nor does she represent its
European cliché. Reverting back
and forth between the layers that
pertain to that other side, she canns
not belong to one idea, but diversifies
into many.
Mashrabiya’s are the center of
Susan’s corporeal juxtapositions, allowing and disaa
allowing the conventional imagery of a modern Egypt
with all its historical glory, she reaffirms cultural qualita
ties in the diversity of her work by playing with an open [yet
closed from public view] window, commonly seen in the archita
tecture of Old Cairo and certainly available in its rural disperses.
She navigates through an escaping combination of
Photo credit: Russ Kientsch
science and mathematics, a modulus diversus that
abstractly references belonging while not belongia
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IN RETROSPECT
ing. As much as you can be part of a place at a certain time, to cross-terrains and transport an empty cage from the Delta
you can also not belong and still be completely part of it. This ta to Cape Town by ship. She was already crossing physical
is where her visual production offers a welcoming array that boundaries.
cannot be restricted by cultural clichés and instead it is what Exhibited on the entrance of The National Galla
you want it to be.
lery, was the beginning of the concept of ‘vitrines’ that later
Briefly commencing with the Cairo Bienna showed up in her work, and in this scenario, Susan occupied
nial, Egypt 1992, Susan exhibited her first solo show. A multa with a peasant-like showcase an institution that only housed
timedia installation with digital photographs in Cairo, unda European art. The Grid was Susan’s empty gift for the people
der the connoisseurship of Ahmed Fouad Selim and the late of Cape Town who were invited to put their gift inside in
Fatma Ismail (ex-curators of the biennial), she was invited for order to complete the work. Developing a personal relationsa
the second time to show at the Biennial by December 1998 ship with the women was part of Susan’s natural process and
and won the International Grand Prize. Hefuna was indepa it resulted in their telling stories. She gained their trust, and
pendent from the contemporary art scene, and recognized as essential participants to her work, they brought personal
for her mashrabiya’s, a theme not considered any less conva objects and items into the exhibiting space. Objects that were
ventional from the work alra
offered to the ‘afas (‘cage’ in
ready produced within the
Arabic) included things like
African spiritual stones, porca
city’s palpitating setting, her
work clearly stood out with
celain cups, Arabic scriptures
its unconventional overlays
from the Quran, dolls, childa
dren’s toys, dry grass that carra
of pinhole camera techniques
combined with digital phota
ried ancestral spirits, and her
tography. At that same event,
favorite: an Ostrige egg from
Susan met William Wells, the
an Indian Muslim woman
director of The Townhouse
with writings of the 99 names
of Allah. Inspired by the diva
Gallery of contemporary art,
a space that only opened a
versity of her audience, peopa
month earlier with an unka
ple from many religions and
known fate at the time.
cultures, a “rainbow nation,”
By 2000, Susan had
they were also not the typical
Above and below from Cityscape Cairo Series, 2001.
her first solo show at The Photography 60 x 80 each
museumgoer.
Townhouse Gallery and beca
Publicity around the event
came officially affiliated since then. She had met a curator at traveled by word-of-mouth. Not one flier was distributed,
The National Gallery in Cape Town, South Africa that same and a pool of unorthodox visitors occupied the space. The
year and was invited to a 3-month artists residency program. audience’s involvement included poetic hymns, dancing, and
Susan got to experience two sides to a newly introduced Afra even food was brought into the National Gallery. Becoming
rican community; an all-white university in Stellenbosch a political piece, the space also became a temporal shrine.
(1), and separately she was to give workshops with Muslim Societal segregation was broken and once again Susan was
women in the local community. Even though there was no deconstructing the status quo and breaking the label. Being
more apartheid, the communities were still quite segregated. careful on how people define
At the same time Susan worked with South African students each other and define themsa
on the theme of “Life Stories.” During her 3-month stay, she selves, her work continues to
had met so many people from the locale she then came up explore ‘identity.’ “We cannot
with a new idea. The Grid Project was based on a wooden assume the obvious and we
cage made of palm wood. Usually used to transport fruits, cannot always define others acca
vegetables and animals from the rural areas, Susan decided cording to the stereotype, and
(1) Universiteit Stellenbosch University http://www.sun.ac.za/
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IN RETROSPECT
that is exactly why the viewer is important in my work, they
are responsible of how they see themselves and those around
them,” said Susan. “Everyone sees their own version of the
same picture, and the artwork is not separate from its viewea
er.” (2)
By 2001, The Townhouse Gallery was running for
its third year and still going strong. It began to expose an
avant-garde wave of artists in the contemporary locale and
joined forces with two other significant and independently
run spaces that had their own subtle ripple effect in the city:
Espace Karim Francis and Mashrabia Gallery. Together they
designed the first art festival in Cairo, Al Nitaq, and Susan,
amongst other talents, created the first contemporary public
art in downtown’s Talaat Harb Square.
Hanging from the building façade right above Groppa
pi restaurant, an age-old cultural landmark in the heart of
the downtown area was a red cloth with old photographic
group exhibition titled 4 Women/4 Views, Susan had continua
ued to travel between cities. She gained significant presence
in London, and by 2003 she was exhibiting in the Center
for Contemporary Culture, a show curated by Rose Issa in
Barcelona, followed by DisORIENTation curated by Jack
Persekian in the Haus der Kulturen der Welt in Berlin.
In a published conversation with Rose Issa (3), Hefa
funa dwells on her process and identifies the reading of her
work as dependent on cross-cultural codes. Inviting the flexia
ibility of her viewer’s background, it is through their choice
of perception that they bring associations to her series of
drawings. They can relate to both differences and similarities
at once when identifying with the structures she has to offer.
Bouncing back and forth from a micro to macro approach,
Hefuna develops her Cityscape Series. A variety of ink, pencil
and watercolor drawings, in various dimensions, they take on
the shape of a visual game, like ‘connect the dots.’
From the Cityscape NYC Series, ink on paper., dimensions variable. Courtesy of the artist
prints of a city, its outskirts, and silhouettes of figures on the
fore and hind of abstract mashrabiya designs. Motifs conventa
tionally seen near the staged setting, Hefuna was already on
her way confirming her signature in the cultural scene. Takia
ing a ‘Greetings from Cairo’ postcard, she designed her own
series of postcards with a loud pantone yellow, and printed
the words CAIRO on one side, and on the other the Islamic
and Gregorian year 1422/2001. Looking like ordinary street
banners in Cairo, Made in Cairo and Printed in Berlin, Hefa
funa continuously re-affirmed her cross-cultural duality.
By 2002, Hefuna was a resident at Delfina Studios in
London, and she was preparing for the first Photo Cairo show
initiated by The Townhouse Gallery. Followed by another
Exploring her own visual memories from her childha
hood summer holiday visits to the Delta, to her own grownup playground, that sheet of paper did not settle in a single
layer, but many layers of tracing and retracing her personal
and emotional journey’s in the form of dots and lines. A conta
tinuous physical process from the commencement of freesa
standing dots, to their connections, Hefuna plays both the
role of the institution and its participant. Before reaching
out to her audience, she required quiet isolation for her own
optimal completion.
Inspired by inbetween-ness: Inside looking out and
outside unable to lurk in, Susan does not settle on a single
zone, and instead grows from constantly traveling, growing
(2) Aida Eltorie in conversation with Susan Hefuna, December 25th 2008, New York City.
(3) Xcultural Codes. Kehrer Publishing, Rose Issa in conversation with Susan Hefuna, London, August 2002. pp.41-44
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IN RETROSPECT
and multiplying. Her lines connect the dots, and those dots
multiply and leap off tracing sheets into wooden screens.
Commissioning the same carpenter’s from the lattice worksa
shops in Old Cairo, three-dimensional grids the size of doors
occupy the space, and between the grid modules come even
smaller units. To those at a distance appear signage’s like
“ANA,” “ICH,” “New Woman,” “Cairo,” “1427,” “1428,”
“1429,” “NOT FOR SALE,” and the infamous “Knowledge
is Sweeter Than Honey.”
Diversification vis-à-vis attendance, interaction, and
participation, the mashrabiya’s are inviting by becoming part
of and completely disbarred from their surroundings. Hefa
funa delineates by recreating a showcase of fantasies and the
silhouette of a dream space.
“Fantasy for me is like breathing air. I do art because
it is the only place for my fantasy to come to life, to create
my own non-verbal language that goes beyond words. I need
to live my Fantasy in order to survive.” Susan tells as she desa
scribes her process, her mask series, and the experiences she
shared with an all girls’ school during a design workshop in
Zayed University in Abu Dhabi last year. She seeks to expose
and nurture subconscious traits of identity, whether in her
own work or through her students. What she receives, she
gives back by identifying with new information, new media
and new ideas. For Art Dubai this year, Susan will be literally
creating a dream space.
Hans Ulrich Obrist described Susan’s Cairo as a
“laboratory,” in their first volume of Pars Pro Toto (4). Susan
works in different cities depending on her travels, whether
in hotels or apartments, her studio takes on the shape of an
isolated site. Even when in the heart of New York City, she
will still manage to disconnect in order to get back to her
drawings without interruption. During a brief Q&A interview with Hans Ulrich
Obrist on February 6, 2009, he was kind enough to share his
thoughts and experiences about his process as a curator and
working with Susan Hefuna:
1. How did you learn about Susan Hefuna, her work, and
what sought your interest?
I felt the necessity of continuing my research by going to the
the Middle East and so I attended the first Dubai Art Fair
3 years ago. I visited The Third Line Gallery and was struck
by Susan Hefuna’s work. The ‘First Interview’ happened in
a very strange format. Everything on that day went wrong,
from the taxi and on the way to the airport, we developed an
incredible spark out of this interview. So we decided to proda
duce a book, and it became a collaborative ‘ping pong.’
2. Tell me about your recent project with Susan? At the Serpentine Gallery, we began producing the Manifa
festo Marathon, and Susan particpated by producing postca
cards, and invited people to write their manifesto’s on the
postcards. It became a collective manifesto. 3. Could you comment on the collaborative piece you are
creating with Susan, the second volume to Pars Pro Toto?
HUO: Pars Pro Toto, Volume 2 is to be launched in August
2009. The third interview is in motion, a work in progress.
While walking in the park, or while sitting in a car, my conva
versations with Susan have been caught off-guard. Susan then
(4) Susan Hefuna, Pars Pro Toto. Ed. Hans Ulrich Obrist. Kehrer Publishing (2008), pp. 15
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IN RETROSPECT
came up with the idea that I could write questions, and she
would answer in drawing. Drawings invented a whole new
role of contribution to this second volume and we are very
excited about sharing it. ***
Susan reflects on her experiences with Hans, as they
were supposed to meet at the Serpentine Gallery, but plans
did change, and she had to meet him on his way to the airport
to New York. Meeting Hans for the first time, and during the
interview session in a car heading to Heathrow airport, and
then through the Heathrow Express airtrain to the airport
terminal. They spoke for two hours non-stop.
By December 2007, Susan’s solo exhibition at The
Townhouse Gallery, took place right before another solo at
The Third Line Gallery and was followed by her first debut
in New York City’s Albion Gallery. Directed by David Ross,
he saw her work in March 2008 at The Third Line exhibita
tion, and decided she would be the perfect inaugural openia
ing for New York’s Albion. Exhibiting beside Vito Acconci,
this show was very well received by a large part of the art
community. Including curators from significant institutions
in the community, Susan was also having a group show in the
New Museum’s Museum As Hub project. Exhibiting along
the likes of Ayman Ramadan, Tarek Zaki and Jan Rothuizen,
the director of the educational and development program
at the New Museum, Eungie Joo, hosted an exhibit, curated
by William Wells, under the concept of Antikhana, or the
neighborhood that surrounds the Townhouse Gallery toda
day.
Part of the solo exhibition Susan had on display at
Townhouse back in December 2007, a collection of objects
showcased in vitrines put on a small crowded street in the
mechanic’s district, was moved into the New Museum’s space
in SoHo, NY. Susan’s work methodology was to always inva
volve her audience, so she originally asked from all the workea
ers in the lane and at the gallery, to meet their wives, mothers
and sisters. She visited their houses, all living in the suburbs
one to two hours drive outside of the city, and asked them to
give her a gift from the house. It took her four months to colla
lect “life stories” with all the women in the downtown Cairo
neighborhood.
The vitrines on the street, were moved daily, by peopa
ple from the street. Each object would tell a story; a plate,
had a story about a life or a relationship, a particular memory.
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The objects had hidden stories, fantasies if you will. A dream
space was created by involving and collecting works from the
neighborhood. Very much like the dream space Susan had
constructed 10 years earlier in Cape Town, a new dream
space is being constructed at this moment at the Dubai Art
Fair 2009. For the first time, Susan will be building a three
dimensional mashrabia house. Breaking away from a single
“Fantasy for me is like breathing air.
I do art because it is the only place for
my fantasy to come to life, to create my
own non-verbal language that goes beyyond words. I need to live my Fantasy
in order to survive.”
screen, you will now be able to walk all around the concealed
module.
Learning about why Susan started to show in Egypt,
her response was: “It is important to keep true to where you
are from.” and Townhouse was that experience. She develoa
oped a very different relationship with Cairo then she had
in Dusseldorf. She mainly went there for post-production in
photographs and books, so Germany acted as a site to take a
step back and re-evaluate her experiences around the rest of
the world. “It was always good to have that distance.”
Susan Hefuna has exhibited at the Louvre, National Gallery in
Cape Town, The British Museum, participated in several group exhibs
bitions, as well as solo shows in; The Third Line Gallery, The Townhs
house Gallery of contemporary art, and this year be seen at the Victors
ria & Albert Museum for the Jameel Art Prize, Youniverse (Seville
and Granada Biennials) and the Venice Biennial 2009.
Display of books by and about Susan Hefuna; Pars Pro Toto. Ed. Hans Ulrich
Obrist, Published by Kehrer (2008). xcultural codes. Ed. Hans Gercke and Erna
nest W. Uthemann, published by Kehrer (2004). Photo credit: Amr Mounib
IN RETROSPECT
Mirage 07, Sharjah Biennial, 2007
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Knowledge is Sweeter Than Honey, 2006
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Not For Sale, 2006
Embroidered cotton
Approx 100 x 150cm
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INTERVIEW
and Hans-Peter Feldmann used the fridge for a show within
the show.
What I find interesting is that curating, when I first started
to work in this field, was less expanded. There were very few
options for curating explored in the early 90s. One of my key
experiences was when I was around 18 in 1986/87, I went to
see Alighiero Boetti [the Italian conceptual artist]. I went to
see him at a very early stage of my trajectory and Alighiero
Boetti told me, ‘as an artist I am always asked: “Do you know
what you want to do”’. At that time I didn’t know what I
wanted to do. I knew I wanted to work with artists and that I
was obsessed with artists. Boetti replied that as an artist he is
always asked to do the same thing – he is asked to do exhibita
tions in museums, he is asked to do exhibitions in the gallery,
he is asked to do exhibitions in the art fair, and he has to do
things for auctions and sometimes even public commission.
But Boetti also said that there are so many other things an
artist has the desire to do, and so he said, “that could be an
idea for me because one should not do what everybody does,
but maybe it’s more important to actually explore all these
other possibilities.”
Photo by Domink Gigler
An interview with Hans Ulrich Obrist
Contemporary Practices: Thank you for taking the time to
meet with us. I would like to start out by asking about your
background, how did you start before the practice of curatia
ing?
Hans Ulrich Obrist: I studied economics, political science
and sociology in St Gallen and then, as a student, started to
organize my first exhibition with Fischli/Weiss and Christa
tian Boltanski in my kitchen – a show in my kitchen because
I never really cooked, my kitchen was somehow a place to
store books. And then Fischli/Weiss and Boltanski said - we
should, as a project, make your kitchen into a ‘real’ kitchen that will be the exhibition. So, Fischli/Weiss did this beautifa
ful kitchen altar, Boltanski projected a candle under the sink,
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That was a small epiphany or revelation because I suddenly
felt, Wow! I could actually start from all these unrealized
projects and topic projects and then make them happen. I
asked Boetti what would be his dream and he said, “my dream
would be to exhibit in all of the airplanes of one airline and
have puzzles distributed in installation on all airplanes.” It
sounded like a topic so I went back to Austria feeling that
it was an important event to see in collaboration with the
museum. Austrian Airlines surprisingly agreed to the projea
ect and we have been working with them from that time
onwards. They said, “Let’s do it!” So we had, for one year,
Aligihero Boetti on all the Austrian Airplanes. That was the
beginning. From there it continued as an experience, expandia
ing the boundaries of curating. I think it had a lot to do with
the 60s in arts practice. There had been a lot of expansion
going on – we had Andy Warhol and Joseph Beuys, two great
examples of expanded art practice. Curating had rather narra
row boundaries. Still, when I started there was a lot to play
with - there were pioneering figures like Harald Szeemann
from whom I also learned a lot in terms of expanding the
notion of exhibitions. But, there were many ways beyond
art; to curate theater, architecture, design, science, and so on.
Little by little, in the 1990s, I started to do so – for some
INTERVIEW
time I focused on architecture, then on science and literata
ture. Since the late 90s, with shows like Cities on the Move
or Laboratorium or Bridge the Gap, all of these things have
been brought together, so it really was what one could call
‘curating at large.’
CP: And then you published your first volume? Tell me,
during this whole year of practice, which curated interviews
were you looking for, what did you want to observe?
HUO: The interviews were a parallel reality to my curatora
rial work. It was always something I did - talking with artists,
living with artists, always spending time with artists, being
totally immersed in the world of art. It was also from their
disciplines that I thought, ‘if one wanted to understand the
forces which were affective in visual arts, it was important
to understand what was happening in science, in architecta
ture, in literature in political science and so on.’ But this was
always in relation to art, it was not just about going into sevea
eral fields, but always about relationships. Artists would tell
me about scientists, artists would tell me about architects,
and then I would investigate. So to some extent, I felt these
conversations, and particularly my earlier conversation with
Alighiero Boetti - who had passed away by the 90s and I
didn’t really remember everything he told me – made me
think that it was important to keep track of these conversata
tions, like my diary. But it was never intended in the beginna
ning.
It’s almost like when you have a diary, you don’t really think
in the beginning if you would like to publish it. I would write
in my diary because there was an urge to write in my diary.
Then maybe later somebody had an idea – we should publish
the diary! And that’s basically what happened with the interva
views – it is my diary. I always have this digital camera here
so it’s always with me, so from that point of view it’s almost
like my tool, an extension of my body. Whenever I am, in a
conversation with an artist or an architect, I might just start
shooting, and now I have an archive of ca. 1500-1600 hours
of film. It was not intended for public sharing in the first
place, but it later became my ongoing travelogue, travel diary,
and it had a lot to do with this idea of flâneurie. To a certain
extent chance has always played a large role in my practice. It
is some form of controlled chance, but it is definitely always
chance. At that moment, for example, there were publishers
and magazines, so we started thinking that we could publish
some of the interviews, we got them transcribed and then we
did the Venice Biennale book with Francesco Bonami, Pitti
Imagine, and Charta. Then the idea was born to do a book of
1000 pages. It had a lot to do with content outside but also
carried many things unpublished – most of my interview sera
ries are unpublished. An analogy, if I can make a reference,
is with farming. If you have unused land and it continues to
grow, at a certain moment you will re-activate it. Another
analogy can be made with a garden; we have gardens in the
summer, gardens for ourselves, and gardens more for nurturia
ing. Conversation will always be a part of a whole, and that
completion grows out of my practice. Like my book, a lot
of ideas are there and a lot of things become activated later.
Important things can go unpublished, but are there for the
future to be remembered or activated.
My interviews grow slowly, layer by layer. One can also say
that each time, each year, there are other dimensions to this
project which are continuously developing. Two is company,
three is a crowd and everything beyond is a multitude. Most
of my conversations are very intimate. This morning at 6
o’clock we were recording a long interview with Ai Wei Wei
here in Dubai so there was nobody in the hotel but us sitting
in the breakfast room.
CP: Special environment.
HUO: Yes, totally quiet, total focus for two hours, we just
decided that it would be interesting to do some interviews
together. So we went to visit some people, so it’s then three.
Rem and I would interview architects. We went to see the
pioneers like Christopher Alexander, Venturi Scott Brown,
Oswald Mathias Ungers, or Philip Johnson - all those who
were important to Rem in the 70s. Then we did a ‘conversa
sation’ on Metabolism and interviewed all the protagonists
from the Japanese movement of Metabolism, an important
architecture movement in the sixties.
At a certain moment I was invited to do a theatre piece by the
Theater World in Stuttgart, a big theater festival. I told them,
‘I am not a theater director and I can’t do this, but what we
could do is a public interview to stage the interviews.’ In
Stuttgart we invited 24 people to be interviewed for 24 hours
- that was how the invention of the marathon began.
I moved to the Serpentine two years ago and toegther with
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INTERVIEW
Julia Peyton-Jones started to co-direct the exhibition proga
grams and international projects. Julia and I discussed how
we could continue the groundbreaking Pavilion project,
founded and invented by Julia when she did the Amazing
Zaha Hadid Pavilion in 2000. We thought it could be interea
esting to invite the architects to also think about the content
of these buildings. First we invited Rem Koolhaas with Cecil
Balmond. We had long conversations and I felt that, as we
do these long interviews anyway, we could do an Interview
Marathon in London.
We began by building from the Stuttgart experience and we
interviewed 72 people for 24 hours, non-stop. From Doris
Lessing to Zaha Hadid to Brian Eno to Richard Hamilton
to Mary Midgley to Tarek Ali - political activists, artists and
novelists - a very wide spectrum of people that lead to this
idea. We learnt a lot about London through this experience,
it actually became a tool or vehicle to know places and start a
very public way of producing knowledge. Since then we have
been doing these marathons and mini-marathons all over
the world - we did one here in Dubai in the Design Forum
and I did an interview project in Cairo over Christmas. I am
always thinking, if I stop, I don’t want to stop! I also have
this problem that during Christmas I am expected to stop
because everybody in Europe stops, and Cairo was a wonda
derful location not to stop. As Douglas Gordon says: Don’t
stop, don’t stop, don’t stop.
CP: And so you spent Christmas in Cairo.
the next two days? We went to meet a lot of novelists and
architects all over Cairo. By doing this very public statement
on the 24th of December there were a lot of people who
came and suggestions started flowing in.
Susan and I met, in the days following the marathon, Adam
Henein the legendary sculptor, but also novelists like Alaa
Al Aswany who wrote The Yacoubian Building, and other
public intellectuals like Gamal al Ghitani. It’s almost like a
collective process where a lot of people are thinking with me
- Who are the pioneers and protagonists, also of previous
generations, whose practice should be remembered? As Eric
Hobsbawm once told me, “We need an urgent protest against
forgetting.” The interview project is memory and to some exta
tent, in the digital era, we are building a lot of archives but
not necessarily in our own memory. For this reason I often
ask this question when I see a younger artist, “Who are your
influences, who are your artists from the past, who inspired
you and your research?”
In India, this led to very interesting discoveries and re-disca
coveries. A lot of young artists for example said, “We reaa
ally love Tyeb Mehta, you must meet him,” so we went to
Mumbai, to his studio, and we held a long interview with
him. In Dubai last year I asked the same questions, “Who
are your pioneers?” Susan Hefuna’s pioneer, for example, is
Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian, so then yesterday we inta
terviewed Monir.
Something else interesting happened yesterday, which again
HUO: In Cairo I interviewed several of the Artists and it shows how this project works to some extent in a very free
was a very interesting experience. It was an idea we develoa way. I was also asked to interview Anish Kapoor for the Dubai
oped with Susan Hefuna and the interview project is now Art fair. Anish is now doing large scale projects - which are
out there and it continues to grow in a very organic way. So actually collaborations with Cecil Balmond [structural enga
there is no master plan for ten years time - thinking it will gineer, teacher and author] - that consist of bridges, mostly
still be there is far too linear. It is much more organic as it projects of architecture, at this large scale.
grows and grows each time through life and happenstance.
This is a collective way of building knowledge - and hopefa New architectural projects are collaborative projects, and it
fully intelligence - and there are a lot of people who contribua interests me that these works can be seen here [Dubai]. Ania
ute. With the more collective events, like the marathon, the ish got the flu and could not travel, so I did what I always
aim is also to build communities and build bridges between do – recorded the interview in the studio, filmed it, and yesta
different disciplines.
terday, we screened my video. Something I have never done
before - if you noticed - I never showed these videos. Still
When talking with Susan Hefuna, we brainstormed about holding almost 1600 hours of footage, never been screened.
how we could develop this format by doing these Cairo inta Yesterday was a test with the possibility of using this matera
terviews on December 24th, but what about the next day, rial.
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INTERVIEW
aware of this. I also think it important to have
conversations with the artists to be able to questa
tion these categories. However, what is interestia
ing about it is that this is a focus that we will
go into more depth with and one can research
anywhere, in art galleries in hundreds of cities
– everywhere! But I think it is more important
to return many times to the same places and go
into more depth.
When we went to India we realized that one
of the most important art schools in that part
of the world is in Lahore and not in India. You
cannot look at India without looking at Banga
gladesh or Pakistan or Sri Lanka - there may be
different categories and we might need to adda
dress them. I always believe in listening to the
Photo by Armin Linke
CP: What are your observations regarding artists from the
Middle East and the art coming from the region right now?
When did you start to focus on the region?
HUO: Yes, the beginning was, I think, about 2 years ago
when I moved to London and we started with Julia PeytonJones at the Serpentine Gallery, thinking about what was urga
gent for a public institution in the 21st century in London.
Since the early 90s, there was a big seismic shift in the world.
I moved to France at the beginning of 1997 with a grant
from the Cartier Foundation. I was the curator in this resida
dency program with other artists. My neighbor was Huang
Yong Ping, the pioneering artist from China. So here I am,
a Swiss curator, in the early 90s in Paris and there were all
these very exciting non-western artists. There was a big shift
that obviously led to many exhibitions in the 90s. With Hou
Hanru we did cities on the move - I went to China maybe
30 times. We discussed with Julia that it could be really impa
portant to connect London art more to Eastern art centers
and start to think about how the Serpentine could work with
China, India, and the Middle East in a more sustained way
- not just by doing one off shows but by doing longer-term
projects, and teamed up with Gunnar Kvaran, the Director
of the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art. We have a
critique on geographically bound exhibitions. They are over
simplified, and obviously the concepts on what is Indian art,
what is Middle Eastern art are very problematic and we are
artists and being very open. But what this early research has
shown is that there are several unbelievably dynamic centers.
Another problematic factor, I think, is that many of these
projects are geographic projects - the China show, India
show, Middle East show. But many institutions are now doia
ing them in that kind of “one off ” sense, and to some extent
there could be some form of jumping on the ‘band wagon’
- like it is a fresh perspective so let us cross it off the list and
then move on to the next thing. I do not think that it is inta
teresting. It is more interesting to think about sustainability,
the legacy, and its long-term effect. When we work on these
projects, it is not based on one show but it is a much more
sprawling experience. For example, these conversations are
happening here [Dubai] at the Art Fair, at the same time the
interview project is taking place in Cairo, and I am curating
panels in Art Basel about the future of the museum.
CP: Also the museum sites in Abu Dhabi.
HUO: Yes, it was about this explosion of new museums, so
that was also a very interesting micro chapter in this research.
So these micro chapters have accumulated over several years
- at a certain moment there will be an exhibition, at a certain
moment there will be research, and then there will be books,
but it develops over several years. It is almost like a migrating
laboratory which changes. It is a learning system that is not
like a “one off ” exhibition, but it is about learning, continuia
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INTERVIEW
CP: Now a standard question about your preferred mediua
um.
HUO: Medium? You mean if it is the exhibition, or the
book, or…?
CP: An exhibition, books, a certain kind of practice, paintia
ing, sculpture, video art.
DAYANITA SINGH, Dream Villa 11 - 2007 2008
Image taken in “Indian Highway” show at The Serpentine Gallery. Show opens
April 2nd, 2009 at The Astrup Fearnley Museum in Oslo. Courtesy of the artist
and Frith Street Gallery, London
© 2008 Dayanita Singh
ing to learn, and hopefully establishing these regions with a
more profound relationship that lasts 10 or 15 years and is
not just a one-year thing. From that point of view we can say
it has only just begun.
To answer your question about the Middle East, one thing
which has been particularly fascinating is to look at this new
generation and also to look at the pioneers. It is important to
see if there is a big focus in the young artists from the region,
but it is also important to look into the memory and use it
as an opportunity to think about what has happened in the
past. I think to some extent that is always the mechanism otherwise it is just horizontal, you just look at the slice of
what is happening now, but I think it is more profound if you
also look at the whole, question what the pioneers had done
before, what had the artists in previous generations nurtured
and inspired. Particularly, at this time, there is a lot of hype,
a strong focus on the young artists of the region. It is a very
good moment to also protest against the forgetting of what
comes from that. The movement of ‘protest against forgetta
ting’ is a daily practice for me.
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HUO: I have just been speaking this morning, before our
conversation, to Ai Wei Wei and he is a great example of beia
ing in between. He does sculpture and installation, and he
came from a painting background. He draws, has a daily
practice of drawing, he writes, he does architecture, archita
tecture as medium, at the same time he curates. Obviously,
my medium as a curator is the exhibition. Exhibitions are
temporary constellations. They are not usually permanent,
they are not collected, because it is very rare that a whole
exhibition gets collected, it happens sometimes but they are
lucky circumstances, either a museum buys a whole show,
but usually it disperses again and it is only for a very short
time these things have cohesion. Books are out there, howea
ever an exhibition’s ‘temporary-ness’ is also a great chance to
make a lot of experiments possible. If they were permanent
one would less dare to experiment, it is a temporary thing.
So the exhibition is certainly my preferred medium, the exha
hibition has lot to experiment with. The exhibition is also
an invention of display, a new way of seeing. For example,
Marcel Duchamp hung coal bags in the Surrealist exhibition
in Paris, and he was the inventor of a radical display feature.
It is a constituent part of an exhibition - something I am very
interested in. That’s why I very often invite artists and archita
tects to invent a display feature for my exhibitions.
Then there is always the book - I am obsessed by books. I
buy a book every day, I am completely addicted to books. It
probably has to do with my childhood because I grew up in
St Gallen. In St Gallen there is this leading monastery library,
a medieval monastery library, and it had a very clear impact
on me because somehow I was always looking at these great
handwritten medieval books and it created a profound relata
tionship between me and books since my very early childha
hood. Then came the moment I started to make my own
books, to edit them, to publish them.
I edited quite a lot of series of books, one of which is a sera
INTERVIEW
ries of my own writings called “Don’t Stop” which is publa
lished by Sternberg. Then there is the conversations series
designed by M/M [a graphic design team in France] which
Walther Koenig publishes. It is a series of, so far, 20 books
which bring together my recurrent interviews with artists as
though we were in an infinite conversation. Then there are
my own series of artists’ books occurring with every exhibita
tion catalogue - every show produces a catalogue. I always
thought, “is it the exhibition that’s my favorite medium or is
it the book?” Last year it was the exhibition and this year I
am doing more books than exhibitions, next year it might be
the exhibition again - it kind of oscillates. There are also moma
ments when it comes together and there are books that acts
as exhibitions. These I am particularly fond of. Conceptual
art exhibitions can actually be the book, can be the show, so
that’s how we should do it, with the instructions and recipes,
the book is the show and then people can interpret it like a
musical score.
HUO: In Cairo?
CP: In Cairo – was it a long process of research, following
the art scene?
HUO: It was very layered, multilayered. It started with Willa
liam Wells, director of The Townhouse Gallery. He invited
me to do this in his gallery.
CP: It was your first time in the Townhouse?
HUO: William invited me with Susan Hefuna they both
had the idea. It always starts with the dialogues with the artia
ists in my research. Susan would say, “You should come to
Cairo.” Then I spoke to several other friends and when we
did the marathon it was my first time in Cairo, the first day.
During the marathon, and mainly after the marathon, there
were a lot of people involved. Many new suggestions popped
It interests me how art can travel differently, not just through up - to meet this person, you should really admit this person,
objects but also through other forms such as through scores, why isn’t this person here and so on. I had a lot of reactions
through partitions, through instructions, through recipes, and this was after a lot of people came to me and said, “You
and the most recent project in this realm, or in this sector, should really meet this artist.” Then, the day after the marata
is the more formal approach - asking 120 artists what is their thon, we also went to see Gamal al Ghitani whose name was
formula for the 21st century, what is their creation of the given to me by the great writer Tayeb Salih whom I interva
21st century formula?
viewed several times.
CP: What recent book had an impact on you?
CP: It also has a lot to do with branding. You discover.
HUO: I am reading David Deutsch’s Fabric of Reality, a
book on parallel realities as well as a lot of science books
all the time. I am reading Marcus du Sautoy’s new book on
mathematical writing, he is a brilliant mathematician. At the
same time, another book that inspired me a lot is a memoir.
Because of the concept of memory, a memoir that is in an
interesting way very dynamic and not nostalgic, is the book
by J.G. Ballard . His autobiography, about the miracle of life,
just came out last week.
HUO: The homogenizing forces of globalization are also
at stake in art and in curating and that can obviously lead
to things starting to look the same everywhere. Edouard
Glissant, the great writer from Martinique, pioneered ‘creoa
olization’, lives in France and New York, and is one of the
greatest poets, philosophers, and public intellectuals of our
time. Glissant also emphasized the importance of archipelaa
ago, more than continental things, which was so important
for me and for my shows, so it was more of an archipelago
condition and not an empowering continental force. And
CP: I have a quote here from Fumio Nanjo - he used the what Glissant really taught me was to find ways to resist the
term “networking curators.” It helped him to research distant homogenizing forces of globalization. It is not the first time
art practices. So what kind of networking is involved with that we have had globalization, we’ve had earlier moments
the Cairo Marathon Intervention? Who makes your lists in of globalization, but the current moment of globalization is
general, who proposes practices of interest to you and who more virulent, it’s more aggressive maybe or what would be
helped you in the Middle East interventions?
the word - more extreme. Glissant is a toolbox because he
showed me that to reject globalization completely, or global
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INTERVIEW
dialogue, leads – obviously - to the reclusion in local manner,
which I think is not interesting. To embrace it wholeheartea
edly is even worse because it leads to the disappearance of diffa
ference - objects and exhibitions look everywhere the same,
local differences disappear. For me it is a negotiation, I try
to negotiate between the local and the global in the sense
that I engage with global dialogue but at the same time try
to be aware that if I make something it has to produce diffa
ference, so it is a difference in producing global dialogue.
Glissant calls that mondialité. So for me this is important as
right now two of my shows are happening in dozens of diffa
ferent countries. In that case, you have a very good point, it
does have to do with branding, but for me it has a lot to do
with developing ‘laboratories’ which are all different and take
into account local research. If this happens a project - with
instructions - will make local research, get and local artists
involved, and turn changes the project fundamentally.
CP: Right now, regarding interest in the Middle East, the
Art Fair this year [2008] and the new museum site in Abu
Dhabi, from your perspective, does this affect the situation
in the art market economy?
HUO: There is an extraordinary energy, there is also an exta
traordinary appetite for new institutions. I think what is so
important is that it is not just replicating Western models, it
is not just going to be institutions which look the same evea
erywhere. But it is a great opportunity to develop truly differea
ent institutions. To rethink what museums in Dubai, Cairo,
London or in any other part of the world actually are – it is
a very different situation. It is a great opportunity to actually
reinvent the museum and start to think that there shouldn’t
just be museums of objects, maybe there could also be a musa
seum of processes, maybe there could be a more time based
museum, maybe there could be all of these things. There is an
issue at stake, however, a lot of hardware is being built right
now. We see museums going up everywhere. When I travel I
see new museums, new wings, new hardware. And the questa
tion is - what could be the software to fill it?
The main question is what will be the content? The content
is the artists and the curators who are essential for these art
scenes to function and to start to become as dynamic as they
cam be. It will also be very important that there are more
schools, there aren’t enough strong art schools and curator
schools in the region. And I think it is incredibly important
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– it is not just an import-export thing - that in the future,
curators from the region run these museums.
When the Black Mountain College happened in New York
in the 50s it was the kind of awakening atmosphere at the bega
ginning of an exciting era with Cage and Rauschenberg and
Chamberlain and many others. I feel we urgently need a new
Black Mountain College for the 21st century which builds
new bridges between art and architecture and literature and
music to go beyond the fear of pooling knowledge and create
something new.